2017 Arizona Sinagua and Lots More Rimrock House

2017 Arizona Sinagua and Lots More Rimrock House This time we stayed in a house that was owned and decorated by an artist who works with metal, particularly iron. His pieces were located within and without his house. Moreover, he was quite addicted to the color red, as the pictures below illustrate. Luisa Wetherill Smoki Museum, Prescott, AZ We drove to Prescott to visit with Harvey Leake, whom we had met on the Wetherill tour two years ago. He greeted us at his charming octagonal home and showed us his extensive collection of documents and memorabilia of the Wetherill family. Harvey took us to the Smoki Museum, where he is a trustee, to see the exhibit about his great-grandmother, Luisa Wade Wetherill, for which he had provided the photographs and other data. Luisa Wade married John Wetherill in 1896 and thereafter they managed a series of trading posts, including at Oljato, UT, in what was later to be called Monument Valley. They eventually ended up with the trading post at Kayenta, AZ, in the heart of the Navajo Nation. Luisa learned Navajo and spoke it fluently. In fact, Navajos named her Asthon Sosi, meaning “Slim Woman,” because she was so completely immersed into Navajo life and culture. Harvey Leake discovered in her papers a manuscript, which he published, in which she had translated and inscribed the reminiscences of a Navajo man named Wolfkiller. The exhibit was open from January 14 to July 5, 2017. 27th Annual Zuni Festival of Arts & Culture The Zuni Festival is one of the Native American festivals conducted by the Museum of Northern Arizona in Flagstaff. The others are devoted to Hopi and Navajo. Virtually the entire exhibit area of the museum was devoted to tables at which Zuni arts and crafts were available for purchase. Lectures on such topics as “Zuni Ancestral Foods” were also available. And then the dancers. “Zuni Olla Maidens” and “Cellicion Zuni Dancers” For a video clip of the dancing, click here. McGuireville Memorial Day Weekend Tractor and Engine Show The Sinagua The ancient cultures around Flagstaff are known as the northern Sinagua. And those of the Verde Valley, south of Flagstaff, are the southern Sinagua. Early Spanish explorers named the mountains of these regions Sierra Sin Agua, “mountains without water”; anthropologists and archaeologists adopted the Spanish term for the inhabitants of the ruins they found. Montezuma Castle National Monument Montezuma Castle’s 20 rooms are built of Montezuma Castle limestone blocks and roofed by sycamore logs overlaid by poles a n d g r a s s e s . Entrance was by ladders from the valley of the creek below and, also, from the cliff above by ropes. The slope below contains trash, graves, and remains of older houses. Like Montezuma Castle, Castle A reached 5 stories but, Castle A unlike Montezuma Castle, it was on ground level. Felled by a fire while it was still inhabited, it was not stripped by pot hunters as its neighbor was. Many burials were found, w i t h r i c h g r a v e goods. The Sinagua: Montezuma Well Though Montezuma Well is part of Montezuma Castle National Monument, it is separated from the Castle by about four miles via McGuireville and Rimrock, though a bit farther by I-17. Montezuma Well is 368 feet wide with a consistent depth of 55 feet. This natural limestone sinkhole is continuously fed by underground springs. Over 1,400,000 gallons of water from the springs flow through the sinkhole every day. Water in the Well is highly carbonated due to high levels of carbon dioxide. Though Hohokam from the south settled at the oasis in the 7th century, the Sinagua, who built the structures under the cliffs along the rim of the Well, came about 1000, leaving by 1400. The Sinagua: V-bar-V Heritage Site V-bar-V Heritage Site, the largest rock art site in the Verde Valley, is managed by the US Forest Service. It opened to the public in 1996 after being preserved the owners of the V-bar-V ranch, which was secured by the University of Arizona College of Agriculture in 1995. The Beaver Creek Rock Art Style has been formally described through studies of rock art sites in the Beaver Creek area, especially at V- Bar-V. The Beaver Creek Style, found throughout the eastern half of the Verde Valley, is characteristic of the Southern Sinagua culture between A.D. 1150 and 1400. A unique feature of V-bar-V is the solar calendar that casts shadows at certain figures on the solstices and at certain times of day. It is thought that the Sinagua used the calendar to determine the day to begin planting crops and to calculate the timing of festivals. The Sinagua: Palatki Heritage Site At the end of a dirt road near Sedona, the Palatki Heritage Site contains two remains of Sinagua dwellings, only one of which is open to the public. They were built early in the 12th century and were occupied until the middle of the 13th century. Jesse Walter Fewkes ( S m i t h s o n i a n ) g a v e Palatki the Hopi name of Honanki, Badger House. Hopi migration stories include stops at Palatki without naming it. The rock art is quite close to the cliff dwellings but it is not related to the buildings. Though many of the 1000 designs are Sinagua, some are 6000 years old—far older than the cliff dwellings. The Sinagua: Honanki Heritage Site Honanki, a sister site to Palatki, contains as many as 60 rooms. Like Palatki, Honanki was named by Jesse Walter Fewkes in the 1890s. Honanki in Hopi means “Bear House.” The Sinagua occupation of Honanki was probably between 1130 and 1280. The "Honanki Phase” is the name for this period of Sinagua prehistory. In the photograph below, notice the rock art in the lightened oval high above the ruined pueblo. The Sinagua: Tuzigoot National Monument Sinagua farmers built their homes on a long ridge 120 feet above the Verde Valley in north-central Arizona. They began building about the year 1000 only to abandon their village in early 1400. Though they lived on the ridge, the Sinagua farmed the usual corn, beans, and squash in the fields below. At its peak (late 1300s) the pueblo contained 86 ground- floor rooms and about 15 2nd-story rooms, in which around 225 people lived. Living space was on top of the rooms more than it was within them. Entrance was by ladder from the roof. The name Tuzigoot is not Sinagua (the language the original inhabitants spoke is unknown). Tuzigoot stems from an Apache word meaning “crooked water.” The Sinagua: Wupatki National Monument Wupatki National Monument, north of Flagstaff, is an example of northern Sinagua. “Wupatki” in Hopi means “tall house.” Pictured above is the principal pueblo, although there exist several others in fairly good condition, namely Wukoki, Citadel, and Lomaki. The monument includes more than the Sinagua ruins, including, even, Clovis finds. A major population influx began soon after the eruption of nearby Sunset Crater (also a national monument) in the 11th century, which blanketed the area with volcanic ash, thus improving agricultural productivity with the soil's greater ability to retain water. An estimated 2000 immigrants moved into the area during the century following the eruption, only to leave by early in the 13th century. The panorama below shows two circular constructions. In the foreground is a large open-air ceremonial feature; it is not an Anasazi great kiva though it has some of the features of one. In the distance, at right, is a ball court that shows Hohokam influence. .

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